TKAM Allusions
To Kill a Mocking Bird
Chapter 1

Andrew Jackson: 7th President of the United States (1829-1837).

Battle of Hastings: a decisive battle in the Norman Conquests of England in 1066.

Cornwall: a country at the southwest tip of England.

disturbance between the North and the South: The Civil War (1861-1865).

Dracula: the 1931 film version of the famous vampire story.

flivver: another name for a Model-T Ford.

Jamaica: an island country in the West Indies, south of Cuba.

John Wesley: 1702-1791. Founder of the Methodist Church.

Meridian, Mississippi: Meridian is a city in east Mississippi.

Merlin: King Arthur's adviser, prophet and magician.

Mobile: a city in southwest Alabama.

no mother to buy it with: an allusion to the Great Depression.

nothing to fear but fear itself: an allusion to President Franklin D. Roosevelt's first Inaugural Address.

Pensacola: a city in northwest Florida.

Philadelphia: a city in southeast Pennsylvania.

stump hole whiskey: illegally made and sold whiskey that would be hidden in the holes of tree stumps.

Tuscaloosa: a city in central Alabama.

Chapter 2

Bullfinch: an allusion to Bulfinch's Mythology, a famous collection of Greek myths. Jem is kidding, of course, but his reference to Bullfinch's Mythology is another indication of how much of a reader Scout has always been.

Dewey Decimal System: a system for organizing books in libraries. Contrary to what Jem tells Scout, this Dewey system has nothing to do with John Dewey, a theorist of progressive education.

diaries of Lorenzo Dow: Lorenzo Dow (1777 - 1834) was a Methodist preacher who traveled throughout the country, including the state of Alabama.

Here's a quarter: if a quarter doesn't seem like enough, remember that, during this portion of the Great Depression, a nickel bought a loaf of bread, a movie was a dime, and gasoline could be had for sixteen cents a gallon.

the crash: the Stock Market Crash of 1929 which led to the Great Depression.

union suit: a one-piece garment of underwear with a buttoned flap in the back.

Union: one side in the Civil War (the north).


Chapter 3

man who sat on a flagpole: Flagpole sitting was one of the stranger fads of the 1930's.


This information was fromhttp://tokillamocking.tripod.com/id25.html which was copied from
http://www.lausd.k12.ca.us/Belmont_HS/tkm/allusions_all.html. Anything written as for the allusions were directly from there and I do not take any credit for writing them.
The illusions were all found through a google search.